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Glory pair enthused by new coach

15 February 2013 10:12

Perth Glory duo Travis Dodd and Josh Risdon have hailed their first week of training under new coach Alistair Edwards.

The Glory have endured a tough season in 2012/13, and sit bottom of the A-League ladder after losing their past five matches, with a crunch home clash to come against leaders Central Coast on Saturday.

Former Glory striker Edwards took over the reins at nib Stadium on Monday following the departure of Ian Ferguson and has already made a positive impression on both Dodd and Risdon.

"With Alistair and Gareth (Naven) coming in, that's motivation for the players to try and prove themselves to the coach and prove to ourselves that we can still play good football," Dodd said.

"Everybody's on their toes and playing for a spot in the 11 again.

"It's been a really sharp week in training and everyone's been really focused, so hopefully there’ll be an improvement this weekend.

"The boys are confident and the coaching staff are confident that we can go out there and play well."

Risdon, who worked extensively under Edwards' assistant Naven during his time in the club's youth team set-up, echoed Dodd's sentiments.

"We've been working really hard in training," Risdon said.

"Alistair's got a different way that he wants to play and he's been drilling that into us this week.

"He wants us to keep the ball a bit more and add a bit more movement off the ball as well and there's a lot more tactical stuff involved that he's been trying to get into our brains.

"Everyone knows their jobs now and hopefully we can turn it around, starting this weekend."

Having already lost to the Mariners twice this season, Glory are fully aware of the threat posed by Graham Arnold's team, but Dodd believes his side are more than capable of pulling off an upset win that would keep their finals hopes alive.

"The Mariners are a stand-out team in the competition who are consistently up in the top two," he said.

"Their organisation defensively and their ability to counter-attack are definitely their main assets and we've worked on how we're going to close that down.

"We need to have a balance and not have seven or eight men going forward leaving them gaps to exploit in behind and we've worked on trying to have that cover in midfield to stop those counter attacks.

"If we can individually complete our tasks and complete the team tasks at the same time, that's what is going to win us games and get us into the top six ."